We are always interested to hear from our readers for their own take on some of the problems that appear on this page, and so we are happy to share the following two letters that we received in response to a recent issue (“My mother-in-law is annoyed that we don’t want to baptise our baby”, published in the 13 April edition of Irish Country Living). Thanks to both readers for getting in touch and for sharing their viewpoints.

‘Tell your readers to hold their ground’

Dear Miriam,

We went through a similar experience ourselves. We married in a registry office 32 years ago and we chose not to baptise any of our children. We chose to have a “naming party” for each of them with special relatives appointed to each child.

We did run into quite a bit of opposition, however we stood our ground and it all blew over after a while. While our parents were upset at us breaking with tradition, they did see that we had put a lot of thought into our decision and that we were dedicated to rearing great children, so it is all water under the bridge at this stage.

Tell your readers to hold their ground.

Kind regards,

Regular reader

‘I can understand why the mother-in-law might be concerned’

Dear Miriam,

I was interested in the letter “My mother-in-law is annoyed we don’t want a baptism”.

I see the parents’ point of view for not wanting to be hypocrites about having a baptism when they aren’t practicing Catholics and I do believe they feel they are respecting the church by keeping their child out of church sacraments. However, I can also understand why the mother-in-law might be concerned.

Since baptism is the gateway to all seven sacraments, if you deny a child the sacrament of baptism, you are also denying them future sacraments of reconciliation, First Holy Communion, Confirmation, matrimony, holy orders and anointing of the sick.

Even though the dad is described as being an “à la carte” Catholic, would he not like to be able to bring his child with him to mass on the odd occasion at Christmas or Easter or to a relative’s Communion/confirmation/church wedding etc and for his child to be able to partake fully in those celebrations with him?

Just because the parents don’t practice their faith at this particular point in their lives – they are free and welcome to come back to the church at any time if they so choose. They have the “choice”. But denying their child the sacraments is giving the child no “choice” to be a part of the Christian family and will make it more awkward for him/her to become a practicing Catholic in the future if they wish to.

If the parents don’t want to go to mass etc with their child, I’m sure if the mother-in-law is living close by that she would love to take the child to church with her and would form a lovely granny/grandchild bond in this regard.

And who knows, having the child baptised may in fact bring the parents back to the church that they themselves were privileged to be baptised into.

Regards,

Another point of view